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The Holy Father Addresses the |
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Crisis of Depression |
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| ��������� On November 14, 2003 His Holiness Pope John Paul II met with members of the 18th International Conference on Depression in the Paul VI Hall in Vatican City. The conference was organized by the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers and consisted of 600 medical experts, clergy and laity. Today there are 340 million people around the world who are afflicted with depression, a debilitating illness that can rob people of all happiness or even their lives in the case of suicide. As usual, the Holy Father had some powerful words of insight on the subject. |
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| ��������� The Pope said that, "The spread of depressive states is worrying," and that, "Psychological and spiritual human frailties are manifested which at least in part are induced by society." |
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| "It is important to be aware of the repercussion that messages transmitted by the media have on persons, by exalting consumerism, immediate satisfaction of desires, the ever greater race for material well-being," said the Pope. Faced by this situation, the Pope advised that, "it is necessary to propose new ways so that each one will be able to build his own personality, cultivating the spiritual life, foundation of a mature existence," The Holy Father added that, "depression is always a spiritual trial" and urged those who cannot see the meaning of life to meditate on the Psalms "in which the holy author expresses his joys and anxieties in prayer". He also recommended that the rosary be recited to see Christ through the eyes of Mary and to participate in the Eucharist as a "source of interior peace." |
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| The Pontiff also called on those who care for the depressed, and all those who surround them, to be especially diligent, "to make them perceive the tenderness of God, integrate them in a community of faith and life where they feel accepted, understood, supported, in a word, worthy to love and to be loved." Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragan, president of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, explained how the Vatican was increasing its development of treatment and pastoral care of clinically depressed patients due to the sharp increase in the number of people suffering from depression around the world. |
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| "They say depression is the principal killer of our age, and I don't think one should be surprised," the cardinal said. "Unfortunately, the post-modern culture is a culture empty of values, founded on well-being and pleasure, in which economic profit counts as the supreme goal." For all its progress, he said, modern culture has not been able to do away with death. The fact that the Christian faith faces the meaning of life and death and offers transcendent answers means that it also has much to offer about the topic of depression, he said. |
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| Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, head of the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints, illustrated expressions of depression and of an even stronger faith found in the psalms. The text of several psalms could be read as "expressions of a depressive state," with symptoms of sadness, lack of interest, diminished capacity for work, sleep disturbances, loss of weight, sense of guilt, desire to cry and suicidal thoughts, he said. The cardinal quoted several examples, including Psalm 55: "My heart pounds within me; death's terrors fall upon me. Fear and trembling overwhelm me; shuddering sweeps over me." He cited the distressed author of Psalm 102, who wrote: "I am withered, dried up like grass, too wasted to eat my food." At the same time, he said, many psalms exalt the goodness of God and the created world and, in that way, offer a response and a remedy: the conviction that "man is always loved and appreciated by God," that the world is not hostile but good, and that is it normal to express one's emotions. |
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Mental illness as a whole deserves a much greater amount of support, attention, and understanding than it currently receives. There is still a very real and painful stigma attached to anyone who suffers from mental illness or who has been in a mental health institution. When someone goes to an ordinary medical hospital, people think nothing of it, but when someone goes to a mental hospital, people suddenly change. There is great ignorance and even fear attached to those who suffer from these diseases, which those who suffer from most physical diseases do not have to endure. In many ways, particularly with depression, it can be the front line of spiritual combat. |
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Clinical depression is not simply being down or sad, and one cannot simply "snap out of it" as so many people command them. It is a very serious and debilitating disease, which takes away a person's sense of self-worth. They stop caring about themselves, and from there stop caring about anything at all. In severe cases, it can even be deadly. The Devil would like nothing better than for every one of us to think so little of ourselves that we stop believing God could possibly love us; it is to his great advantage that everyone loses hope. Christ is the ultimate solution, he who loves everyone unconditionally, who is always willing to forgive and forget, who will never leave us nor forsake us, who is ready amidst all the battles of life to be our fortress and high tower. |
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I would ask everyone, when considering a donation for a good cause, to keep this one in mind. |
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The Plague of Mental Illness |
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St Dymphna, Pray for Us |
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